Surviving My Way
This week I feel like my body is crashing. My mind is racing all the time, and I cannot look at anything without thinking about Prince – and wishing he could be with me continuing to experience life. Many people have asked how I have been surviving – how I can get out of bed – how I can walk around – how I can continue to fight for justice. I wish I could explain the terrible feeling I have inside every single minute of every single day. Instead, however, I give them a pained smile and say things like, “I have no choice” or I just shrug my shoulders. While I understand the questions, I continue to struggle to find an appropriate answer because I don’t believe there IS a right way to act when something like this happens. You just survive any way you can.
Earlier this week, I was sitting at my desk (shaking from too much caffeine and not enough sleep) when I realized that it was time to get away for a bit. I decided to take a few days and visit my grandparents (who live in amazingly beautiful place in the middle of nowhere). The sleep that I have finally been getting has allowed me think about how I have chosen to live. It has also allowed me to read some of the courageous letters that I have been getting from my readers. While I will not out any of them by name (for safety reasons), here are some of the things I have heard:
* Terrified women trying to protect their children from the men who have abused then – proof of physical abuse – judges who don’t seem to care. For some reason, judges don’t like to think that a man who abuses their spouse/girlfriend/ex could also be dangerous to the child. Newsflash your honor – abusers rarely discriminate – they likely will also abuse their own child.
* Grandparents fighting to save their grandchildren from disordered parents – judges who fight against them despite evidence of danger.
* A father fighting to save his children from a mother who refuses to leave a convicted child molesters.
* A woman who lost her child for an entire year after Judge Algeo himself legally allowed the child’s father to kidnap the baby girl.
* A woman who now has a baby girl – her only child – but not her first. Her first child was murdered. This woman told me that the death of her son is so painful that she has completely shut out many of her memories of him.
I read these stories and wonder if I will ever live in a world where these things no longer happen. I wonder how I will explain these things to another child someday -Prince’s future sibling. These ugly truths…I can barely even wrap my own head around. I am not sure if I am surviving the right way or if I am just surviving my way. Sometimes I wonder if it wouldn’t be easier to be the type of person who could just run away from all these terrible things and pretend they never happened. I am not sure if this response is right or wrong, but I do know that it would likely not make me feel better.
Children continue to suffer at the hands of Family Court. I often wonder if the Family Courts in our country are even capable of making the right decision. It seems like the court would rather saw the child in half (killing him/her) rather than make the difficult choice to limit or eliminate access of a disordered parent. I also think about the police officers who chose to ignore Luc’s behavior and chose to allow him to walk the streets.
These are things I think about all day long. Whether I choose to lay down in bed crying or walk around faking a smile to hide the pain. I think about these things all the time.
I am sitting in front of the fire and watching the evening news. The news story is about “The Perfect Gift” that a parent can buy for their child for the holidays. As I watch the children’s faces light up with joy, I can’t help but cry. Though I know that I have been keeping up “a good face”, I notice that my face now shows a bit of the agony that I feel inside. Prince will never open a gift and scream for joy at Christmas time. He had one Christmas – just one. The same as he only had one birthday, one Easter, one Mother’s Day…
My heart feels like its beating on the wrong side of my chest. I know that doesn’t even make any sense. I wonder if I can even go tell that to a doctor without him/her looking at me like I was crazy. Sometimes I can’t even breath when I think about Prince. I see things all the time that remind me of him and I try too hard to hear his voice. I have nightmares about Prince bleeding all over me as the doctors unplugged him from the ventilator. In the dream, I keep trying to clean him up and make him all better. I usually wake up from this dream feeling like I have died too.
Shawn Mason died the week of her mother’s birthday in 2003. Luc put naked pictures of Alexis on the internet on Alexis’ birthday in 2009 (he waited months after she left to start this terrorism). Luc filed his response to my custody papers on my birthday in 2011 (three months after I took Prince and fled Luc’s house). This year, the first time Luc saw Prince after my birthday – Prince died. I don’t believe in that kind of coincidence. These are the terrible thoughts that I think about. I wonder if the police see what I can see. I wonder how much they care.
When people ask how I am walking around, I will continue to shrug my shoulder, smile, and say, “I have no choice”. I will smile to make others feel better and I will also continue to tell Prince’s story. Right or wrong – this is how I survive. I will do this because I am a Mama – I am Prince’s Mama.
I am sending you all my love.
I am a mama who also fought. I had an awesome lawyer who got the courts to side with me and won full custody. Because I knew i couldn’t trust my baby to her daddy, as sad as that sounds. My heart is torn apart for you, sweet mama. You fought and did everything you could but the system won and that is wrong.
I recently dealt with someone who had 30+ felony charges on his public record but is still wandering about town. The sheriff who dealt with him said that the judges are in bed with the crooks, they are bought and paid for. I know this is probably the case a small percentage of the time but even that is cause of RAGE! Even if it happens a fraction of a percentage of the time, things like this happen and that is unacceptable. I am sending you all my love tonight, I am glad you are fighting the good fight! I appreciate you and sweet Prince.
Thanks Bonnie. I also had sole custody of Prince. Unfortunately, that wasn’t enough because all it takes is access. And yes, I can believe the 30 plus felony thing. Our justice system is extremely broken.
You are a strong, brave courageous young woman. You are the finest example of a mother trying to protect her child. My oldest son died 9 years ago today. He died from complications from advanced renal failure. He went to sleep and never woke up. He was 31 years old. I know that our circumstances couldn’t possible be more different, but we are actually are more alike than we are different. We belong to a club that no one wants to belong to, mothers whose children have died. People always say, if my child died I would kill myself, I couldn’t live without my child. Most of us find that we have to keep living. Some like me because I have 2 other children, you because you need to fight for justice for your sweet Prince. I am inspired, and sickened by your story, and you know which emotion goes with you and which one goes with that judge. Many of us are sending you good thoughts and hoping that something can be done to our justice system. Good luck Sweetie.
Thank you Donna for your kind words. And I am sorry for your loss. Yes, our stories are different. Your story is painful too. No better, no worse…just different. And yes, we belong to the terrible club that nobody wants to belong to. And I too fight for other children. The ones I will have in the future and the ones who belong to others yet still need fighting for.
I am so sorry. I pray God looks down upon all of us and helps this country to shed some light on family court to see that we are only trying to protect the children we love. The fathers movement has leaned too far in the other direction. You have to be a decent sane human being to care for a child. We are baffled that we are seen as crazy and unstable because my grandchild herself disclosed her father had sexual molested her when she was on a visit with him. There was no divorce, there were no issues before the disclosure yet the DA did not press charges and so we battle in court on and on. Just about every two weeks for eight months he demands visitation so that he can tell her to stop talking. We may look crazy and unstable because an unfit father could end up with visitation again or possibly with custody of this beautiful little girl. I do not want to burden you with our situation but we have to tell our stories. Keep telling our stories as you have so bravely done.I want you to know that there are many of us who know firsthand that the court is so wrong and so blind to a mothers fears. God bless you, take as much time off as possible and mourn. I too have suffered loss and given time we are left with the pure love and cherished memories of the time we had with our loved ones. Grief is hard work; take the time to rest and take gentle care of yourself love. Give yourself the breaks you need often. Ever since I heard your story I have thought of you and your baby often and my strong prayers for justice are with you.
Even though I have not experienced your pain first hand, every sentence you write makes my heart feel like it has been ripped out. You are a strong and wonderful woman to stand up for those that can’t. You are giving a voice to the voiceless and strenght to those that need to stand up for themselves. You are not alone in this battle. There are so many of us behind you. Keep fighting for Prince and all those other babies out there. Maybe through you changes will happen. One day the courts will put the child first. God bless you
Injustice for all, especially when it involves the family courts.
When my son died, I was so selfish. I did not want to talk to anyone about him, even if they had lost a child to the same cancer. They didn’t lose Destry, my son! How could they help? I didn’t mourn for the victims of September 11 until years later, my son died and he wasn’t on the news! I don’t feel that way anymore, time has helped.
You are stronger than you know…and sharing your story DOES make a difference. I totally agree with you about there being a right or wrong way to grieve; who the hell is anyone to say “IF my child died I would blah blah blah”they thankfully have no idea.
I read somewhere before my son died to be prepared because people will say the stupidest things, but to remember they don’t know what to say and just want to take away the pain. Thank goodness I remembered that, because if I had heard one more time at least you can “have other kids”, “have another son”, or “got to go to Disney World” i would have grieved from a jail cell. 🙂
And describing the pain….NOW I KNOW I HAVE A SOUL BECAUSE MINE HAS ACHED. I’m sorry that you understand that.
Summer – you totally made my day! I love your raw honestly. You are totally right. People have no idea what to say. I feel often like I am busy managing my reactions because if I said what I want to say people would likely just run away from me crying and screaming. lol Ok, so that is not really funny but maybe you can understand this humor. And I don’t blame you for not being able to mourn for those on September 11th. I can totally understand that. I had a really hard time voting after Prince died. I thought, “I don’t care who wins because it won’t do a damn bit a good in my life right now. It’s not like they will hold anyone accountable.” I am glad to hear that these crazy feelings get better with time.
Summer, two of my favorite idiotic things people say to us are, god doesn’t give us more that we can handle, really because I feel like I have WAY more than I can handle most of the time. The runner up for stupidest thing to say to someone grieving, Oh, god must really have a special love for you and your child since he sent these trials to you, please? A loving god? Don’t think so any more. I could actually make a VERY long list of things not to say to a grieving mother, but I have other things to do this week, so it will have to wait. We may both yet find ourselves grieving from a jail cell. I just hope mine is next to yours.
The coincidences surrounding the birthdays is not lost on me. The narcissistic sociopath from my recent past put great emphasis on HIS birthday. It was his personal holiday and everyone was expected to make a big deal about it or they’d wished they had made a big deal about it. I am not a big birthday person. I made the mistake of JUST getting him a card one year. It’s truly all I could afford at the time. When my birthday rolled around a few months later, he ACTED like he couldn’t remember the date and gave me a gift 10 days early. I chuckled, not thinking it was a big deal. I said, “It’s the 28th, not the 18th.” I smiled and accepted the gift. He actually got angry because I didn’t get angry. He didn’t forget. He was playing a game in order to hurt me. He was projecting his obsessive need for attention and respect associated with everyone remembering his birthday onto me. It back fired. I didn’t get angry. He didn’t get his Narc supply and his necessary revenge. The police don’t see things like this as real. The merely see them as coincidences. But I guarantee it’s no coincidence. Like all sociopaths/psychopaths, they want to hurt people at their most joyful moments. Birthdays are perceived as very joyful times of the year. What better way to hurt someone than to take away their joy? Dark, dark hearts.
I don’t doubt that there’s a “birthday connection” either. He may have chosen birthdays as a way to increase the pain and suffering. Sociopaths are like that. They have no feelings of their own, but they know that the rest of us treasure special days, so why not ruin those for us if they can? If he truly did this, I hope he gets convicted of murder on his own birthday, and then sentenced to death on the anniversary of his crime.
Yes, dark, dark, hearts. I think the bible refers to these soulless monsters as reprobates.
Christine, I am a very detail oriented person. I figured out this pattern even before Prince passed away. Sadly, on my birthday this year I thought, “what shoe is going to drop this time.” I couldn’t have imagined at the time it getting this bad. I don’t know why I didn’t think about that though…because I did know what sort of monster Luc was. I will not let Luc ruin October for me though. I will celebrate Prince’s life in October and I will also (hopefully) be celebrating Luc’s incarceration during that time as well. My son is my guardian angel. He can’t take that away from me. Whether or not he believes in hell (I do), that is where he is going some day. Prince will make sure of that.
Yes, that’s where he’s going unless he repents, which is highly unlikely. I always tell people that God is the Ultimate Judge whether you choose to acknowledge His existence or not, and Hell exists, whether you choose to accept it or not. One of Satan’s best tactics is to convince his evildoers that he does not exist and that hell does not exist, so that they will do his bidding with no fear of judgment, or of punishment. But judgment will come. “For it is appointed unto man to die once, and then the judgment.” Hebrews 9:27.
I wish we could hold your pain for you, keep it safe in our hearts, so that you could have a few moments of lightness to give you hope that you will get there. And you will get there with Prince forever held safely and happily in your heart. But I don’t have that kind of power. I do know how utterly helpless you feel when you are hit square in the face with the fact that you might not be able to protect your child, I know it first hand and I know how absolutely abandoned I felt when I realized that in the face of overwhelming evidence that my child would be hurt again I wasn’t “really” supported in my allegation. So I did the only thing I could in my power and the person who has hurt and molested my daughter is no longer allowed to have any contact with her. The pain doesn’t disappear, Hera, you just get much better at managing it.
Sister Queen. My sincere condolances goes out to you. I am speechless and hurt by what you are enduring. This family court in United States is screwed up and totally corrupt. I personally experienced standing in front of Judge Algeo in his courtroom and yes he seemed very unconcerned and rolled his eyes and said “my words fall on death ears.” I am a mom also and I can empathize with with your lost Sister Queen. You are an inspiration and the voice I did not have the courage to do.
The most unnatural thing we ever do is bury a child and the only advice I ever give to another grieving mother is we never get over it we just get *through* it somehow. We will carry the memory of standing over a little white coffin until we die ourselves.
You have to survive YOUR way my dear. No one can tell you or show you how. 25 years later and I’m still not sure at times if I’m surviving, coasting is more like it. From reading your blog it sounds as if you have found your way to make it *through* and I wish for you all the strenght in getting you there.
I am so sorry for anyone who has lost a child, I’ve never experienced it, and I pray to god I never will, my friend was married to a psychopath a very terrifying one, he not only threatened to kill his own children, but mine too. Because I took my friend in when she left him. I only realised how much danger my kids were in, when he used to turn up at their school and just watch them. I remember when my children told me he was doing that, until then I just thought it was me he wanted to kill. The thing I hated most is he made me so paranoid, I knew he had some of his friends watching, it’s a bit hard to miss when they are standing across the road just looking at you. I hate that he made me so frightened. I moved out of the area, and changed my children’s school, I’m still friends with my friend, she comes to visit all the time, it’s just we are still both so paranoid. He did terrible things to his youngest, who was 2 at the time, but because there was no DNA he got away with it. He gets away with most things. It’s been going on now for over 6 years. He got UNSUPERVISED WEEKENDS, even with all the evidence we both had, But it’s safe at the moment because he re-married. The lady he married sent her son to live with his father, so I guess she believed us enough to protect her son. He’s already started hitting her and there’s nothing anyone can do. But while he beats her, my friends children are safe. Here in the UK, if you interfere with visitation, you stand a very high risk of losing custody of your children. The courts here are just as bad as the ones over there. A lot of the judges (NOT ALL) I call twat enablers, because they enable the psychopaths to carry on with their abusive ways. I believe that until all twat enablers are stopped, the twat (ie psychopath) will continue.